PVs are fine in remote locations for low-current applications such as lighting. They just don't compete with other technologies as a primary source of energy. Even your citation states that. IMO solar is most appropriate for water and space heating, but even then carries a heavy environmental penalty for mining. Any conversion of our transportation economy from chemical to electric energy (other than nuclear) will require copper mining and the impact of demand pull upon raw material cost is seldom part of the analyses, especially in the case of rare earth minerals (magnets) and precious metals (catylists).
Now (for the real test of your understanding of the situation and how we got here), guess who is the biggest source of funds for RICOnut environmentalists?
The private foundations of stockholders in oil companies.
These homes my wife and I built were not the kind you see splashed across the covers of Popular science, with the PV cells on the roof and all. They simply took advantage of science and nature both, where that was practical.
The first one, near the California coast, was passive solar, but not glaringly so. It had properly constructed South-facing windows, and a South-facing clerestory to let the winter sun heat the rooms which were normally occupied during the day. In the summer, these windows were shaded so the house didn't overheat. An inconnel fireplace was our only heat until we sold the place. Then we had to put in central heat so the buyers could get a mortgage.
I experimented with solar hot water on that one, too. I fabricated some copper panels an built them into a properly-sloped [lattitude plus ten degrees] South-facing porch. The storage tank was a fiberglass horse-trough in the attic with a floating, insulated lid. Even in foggy Los Osos, the system made enough hot water to do our laundry. (We had a faucet right over the washing machine where we could drain the horse-trough right into the machine.)
But "normal" homeowners simply won't [and don't] put up with all the little inconveniences in this type of home: Being a little too cold on some nights, or having to wait for a sunny day to do laundry, etc.
I have a good engineer friend in Los Osos who installed a commercial solar hot water system in 1979. He laughing claims that he is just now achieving break-even. It's probably the only system in California that ever has (if you subtract out all the tax credits).
I highly recommend a book called Your Engineered House by Rex Roberts to get you in the proper frame of mind for building such a house. You'll have to find it at a used book store, no doubt.
BTW, my latest home has 8" thick log walls, double insulated ceilings, .26 U-value windows (and very few of them), and is heated with a Rumford fireplace. No solar features in this one at all, since we're smack in the middle of a forest.
But by golly I will be using an electric heat-pump next summer when it's 90 degrees and 95% humidity outside!
Of course, if you actually HAVE an article that says that, post the link--as I said before, I'd like to see it.
As to your other suppositions and comments--I've heard all of those arguments before, and have yet to see any real data supporting any of them.
As I've said on other threads , my ideal system is 5-10 sites in the western desert states combining nuclear fission (both burner and breeder reactors) AND photovoltaic, with storage and transmission done via hydrogen and pipeline. A good part of the transmission infrastructure is already in place with the natural gas distribution pipeline network (and PLEASE, folks, don't bring up the old conundrum about "pipelines won't work because of hydrogen embrittlement" thing). Let the feds do as they did for the railroads and donate the land from their current massive holdings.